For enhanced safety, the front and rear seat shoulder belts of the Lexus UX have pretensioners to tighten the seatbelts and eliminate dangerous slack in the event of a collision and force limiters to limit the pressure the belts will exert on the passengers. The Buick Encore doesn’t offer pretensioners for its rear seat belts.
In the past twenty years hundreds of infants and young children have died after being left in vehicles, usually by accident. When turning the vehicle off, drivers of the UX are reminded to check the back seat if they opened the rear door before starting out. The Encore doesn’t offer a back seat reminder.
Using vehicle speed sensors and seat sensors, smart airbags in the UX deploy with different levels of force or don’t deploy at all to help better protect passengers of all sizes in different collisions. The UX’s side airbags will shut off if a child is leaning against the door. The Encore’s side airbags don’t have smart features and will always deploy full force.
The UX has standard Whiplash Injury Lessening Front Seatbacks, which use a specially designed seat to protect the driver and front passenger from whiplash. During a rear-end collision, the Whiplash Injury Lessening Front Seatbacks system allows the backrest to travel backwards to cushion the occupants and the headrests move forward to prevent neck and spine injuries. The Encore doesn’t offer a whiplash protection system.
The UX has standard Pre-Collision System, which use forward mounted sensors to warn the driver of a possible collision ahead. If the driver doesn’t react and the system determines a collision is imminent, it automatically applies the brakes at full-force in order to reduce the force of the crash or avoid it altogether. The Encore offers an available collision warning system without the automated brake feature that would prevent or reduce the collision if the driver fails to react.
The UX has a standard Secondary Collision Brake, which automatically applies the brakes in the event of a crash to help prevent secondary collisions and prevent further injuries. The Encore doesn’t offer a post collision braking system: in the event of a collision that triggers the airbags, more collisions are possible without the protection of airbags that may have already deployed.
Over 200 people are killed each year when backed over by motor vehicles. The UX offers optional Parking Support Brake that uses rear sensors to monitor and automatically apply the brakes to prevent a rear collision. The Encore doesn’t offer backup collision prevention brakes.
The UX’s standard lane departure warning system alerts a temporarily inattentive driver when the vehicle begins to leave its lane and gently nudges the vehicle back towards its lane. A lane departure warning system costs extra on the Encore.
To help make backing out of a parking space safer, the UX has a standard rear cross-path warning system, which uses sensors in the rear bumper to alert the driver to vehicles approaching from the side, helping the driver avoid collisions. Rear cross-path warning costs extra on the Encore.
The UX’s driver alert monitor detects an inattentive driver then sounds a warning and suggests a break. According to the NHTSA, drivers who fall asleep cause about 100,000 crashes and 1500 deaths a year. The Encore doesn’t offer a driver alert monitor.
Both the UX and the Encore have standard driver and passenger frontal airbags, front and rear side-impact airbags, driver and front passenger knee airbags, side-impact head airbags, front wheel drive, height adjustable front shoulder belts, plastic fuel tanks, four-wheel antilock brakes, traction control, electronic stability systems to prevent skidding, daytime running lights, rearview cameras, available all wheel drive and rear parking sensors.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration does side impact tests on new vehicles. In this test, which crashes the vehicle into a flat barrier at 38.5 MPH and into a post at 20 MPH, results indicate that the Lexus UX is safer than the Buick Encore:
|
|
UX |
Encore |
|
|
Front Seat |
|
| STARS |
5 Stars |
5 Stars |
| HIC |
52 |
73 |
| Hip Force |
323 lbs. |
388 lbs. |
|
|
Rear Seat |
|
| STARS |
5 Stars |
5 Stars |
| HIC |
96 |
100 |
| Hip Force |
633 lbs. |
672 lbs. |
|
|
Into Pole |
|
| STARS |
5 Stars |
5 Stars |
| Max Damage Depth |
12 inches |
14 inches |
| HIC |
292 |
382 |
| Spine Acceleration |
44 G’s |
46 G’s |
New test not comparable to pre-2011 test results. More stars = Better. Lower test results = Better.
Instrumented handling tests conducted by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration and analysis of its dimensions indicate that the UX is 3.9% to 5.8% less likely to roll over than the Encore.
For its top level performance in IIHS driver and passenger-side small overlap frontal, moderate overlap frontal, side impact, roof strength and head restraint tests, its standard vehicle-to-vehicle front crash prevention system, its standard vehicle-to-pedestrian front crash prevention system, and its available headlight’s “Good” rating, the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety grants the UX the rating of “Top Safety Pick” for 2022, a rating granted to only 162 vehicles tested by the IIHS. The Encore last would have qualified as a “Top Safety Pick” in 2016.